With nearly 200 undocumented Haitian migrants apprehended in the last week, Foreign Affairs and Immigration Minister Fred Mitchell said yesterday The Bahamas is dealing with a "deluge of illegal migrants".

"I wanted to inform the public that we have been dealing with a deluge of illegal migrants who have breached our borders over the past week," Mitchell said in a statement.

"We are working to expedite their immediate return to Haiti."

He was referring to two separate illegal landings last Wednesday.

Authorities picked up 168 Haitian migrants in waters off Bimini on a 50-foot Haitian sloop around 11 p.m.

Among those apprehended were 37 children, some babies six to nine months old.

An additional 10 migrants were interdicted after they landed on Inagua.

Mitchell said the children were transported to a safe house on New Providence. Authorities reported another two landings in March.

Forty Haitian migrants were intercepted onboard an American sailing vessel off Snake Cay, Abaco, on March 21.

Another 61 Haitian migrants were arrested around 2 a.m. on Snake Cay.

The group included 45 men, 11 women, three teenaged girls and two children.

Immigration officers on Eleuthera arrested 28 Haitian migrants after they illegal landed on the island on March 14.

While contributing to the Immigration Amendment Bill in the Senate last week, Minister of State for National Security Keith Bell expressed concern about migrants traveling up the coast of Cuba to northern islands of The Bahamas such as Bimini.

"What does that mean?" Bell asked.

"Bimini has a population of 1,800 people, which means that 10 percent of Bimini's population landed there.

"...This is an issue that all Bahamians must be united on for many reasons.

"The landing of 200 illegal immigrants in Bimini pales in comparison to the 200 that landed some years ago in Ragged Island.

"Ragged Island, the mainland has a population of 72 people. So imagine, twice the size of the population of Ragged Island landed there illegally.

"What does that mean for law enforcement? [It has] national security implications." Bell said that between October 2014 and April 2015 "there has been 21 landings of Cuban migrants alone".

The government borrowed $232 million to purchase nine defense force vessels, which are expected to help in the fight against illegal migration, human trafficking, smuggling and poaching.

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